<p>Onesharon, I don't have the money and wouldn't have hired a consultant in any case, but I did talk to a very highly regarded consultant - the type who does charge $30K or more for services -- and asked whether my daughter had a chance to get into a particular elite college. The consultant told me my daughters test scores were too low by 200 points and that the college would not even look at my daughter, it was a waste of time to apply - and she directed me to a couple of other excellent colleges where my daughter's chances were much better -- but my daughter didn't like or want those colleges. </p>
<p>My daughter is now attending the college where the consultant said she didn't have a chance. So much for expert advice. </p>
<p>The problem is: private consultants are risk-averse; their reputations depend on it. So they try to steer their clients toward colleges where they are reasonably sure of admission -- which also happen to be the kind of colleges where the student probably doesn't need professional help to get in. It's not that the advice is bad -- it's that just it is possible to do better without it. Most of the information the consultants have is readily available in books, including the books that the consultants themselves have written -- so if nothing else it pays to read those books first before hiring anyone. Once you read a couple of those books, it doesn't seem that mysterious any more, and you will have a much better sense of whether you might benefit from professional assistance.</p>
<p>I saw an interview with Michele Hernandez recently and she said that the colleges don't know of her involvement with particular students. So, I don't think she actually lobbies the schools on student's behalf. By the way, her price tag: $40,000. Seems to me this kind of system is only serving to give the 'haves' more opportunity and the 'have nots' even less opportunity. If so many of the the highly selective slots are filled with those who have the money to pay consultants, state schools may be the only option for those without the money to pay consultant's fee. Personally, I don't think state schools are the 'kiss of death', but it does seem to widen the gap!</p>
<p>No doubt some consultants have actually (sometimes improperly) used their influence in certain cases to get coached students admitted, however the (generally) pro-affirmative action major media has become obsessed with coaching - and now are citing it as a major reason why "minorities" cannot compete, and must still be given added points for admission</p>
<p>consider:</p>
<ol>
<li>many "minorities" now at top schools and seeking admission are actually from the upper middle class</li>
</ol>
<p>2 although coaches can help, students can get nearly all the same information on their own </p>
<ol>
<li>"disadvantaged" of course is the new AA buzzword, and presumptively a smart "disadvantaged" student in for example9th grade would supposedly have no idea where to look to find out how to leverage his record for college admissions, which of course is absurd</li>
</ol>
<p>i, personally, think that college consultants are a major help. it gives you another person pushing you to turn stuff in early and to read your essays and offer suggestions. my consultant also helped me balance out my list. but, in the end, my list is still mine and i still had the final say on what went on it. and even though i have a wonderful dean at school who is only repsponsible for like 40ish kids, it never hurts to have the extra help.</p>
<p>I believe that admissions at the TOP schools are aware of the "gaming" that is being choreographed by the consultants. Admissions people are not stupid and will not look favorably upon candidates that are using these techniques.</p>
<p>I think Eskimo Girl has summed up the true value of consultants for some families and some situations.
A "less involved" third party can provide some useful buffering in some families and some situations - particularly if the school's employees can't or don't fulfill this function. It is not so much that the parents/kids can't do the research - they need to do the research even with the consultant. Sometimes you just need an objective opinion. And some nagging.</p>
<p>College consulting is a fast-growing field. The Independent Education Consultants Association is doing a fine job of regulating the qualifications of our members. You can check out <a href="http://www.iecaonline.com%5B/url%5D">www.iecaonline.com</a> for free parent information about how to select the right consultant for you. </p>
<p>Fees are negotiable, in hourly or in the multi-thousand-dollars packages, if the family feels they need a soup-to-nuts approach. However, I recommend that you think about the specific services that you really need. For example, if you only need an verbal overview of the application process, or help with college searching or essay writing, you can acquire that on an hourly basis and avoid a higher, package cost. </p>
<p>Also, admissions officers are very much on the lookout for an overly packaged applicant. The student needs to own the search and application process, and the essay must be in the voice of the student A student who comes across to Admissions as the driver of his or her college selection process, will be perceived as a much more attractive applicant.</p>
<p>we thought about hiring a college consultant
Neither one of us had attended college & while education had been a priority, enough to pay for private school K-12, college was another ball of wax.
However, after finding some college guides that seemed helpful and even communicating quite a bit by email and IM with one of the authors a former education columnist ( no- not Jay Mathews ;) ), we decided that a consultant wasn't necessary , given that we were worried about her being "overly packaged" afterall- nobody was going to care more about the process for our daughter than we did.</p>
<p>$2500 is the correct price for a consultant. $30K is the price for a 'packager'. </p>
<p>Interesting tha many posters assume that the main service on offer is an elitist service to get BWRKs into top colleges. That has not been my observation. I know four separate families who used an IECA consultant--one using the service for three children. </p>
<p>The first family had a son who had significant athletic ability, significant learning disabilities and significant maturiyy problems. THe consultant recommended 5th year boarding school and placed the boy into an East Coast school with resources to address all of his needs. A year later he was accepted into a prestigious East Coast university with an athletic scholarship. He ended up transferring to a large flagship school where he met the love of his life whom he recently married at age 26. He owns his own business and is very successful. He would not have had that success had they not had that expert advice.</p>
<p>The second family hired a consultant to help them with their 14 year old who had fallen in with an extreme drug crowd at his suburban high school. The consultant placed him in a series of residential therapuetic programs where he was able to kick his most severe substance abuse problems. That boy would have died without the intervention. The team of psychiatrists and psychologists he had were not as effective as the educational consultant who found residential palcements for him. He graduated from high school and attended one year of university. He now works and is fully independent as a 20 year old.</p>
<p>The third family was an international family with an extraordinary athlete with significant learning disabilities. I recommended the consultant to them. The consultant recommended a fifth year boarding school which had a good reputaion for his sport and good resources for his disabilities. The consultant then arranged for some financial assistance. The boy is in his sophomore year at a US college on a full athletic scholarship. He is beyond thrilled to be at a US school. His parents are thrilled. He will graduate with a professional degree, an opportunity he would not have had otherwise.</p>
<p>We live overseas. We don't have a GC. We have hired an IECA consultant for S2 even though we know the subject backwards and forwards. I wish I had hired one for S1. The consultant has been a great sounding board and a great editor. Not everyone wants to discuss the specifics of their child's choices on CC. Not every student wants their essays posted on CC. </p>
<p>I have not read the whole thread but want to comment on the 500 note card business. Perhaps that student would not have gotten the same grade as your son if it had not been for those note cards!</p>
<p>I have very strong opinions on this subject. Over the summer I was visiting in the northeast and by the pool at a club a friend belonged to, I heard several parents talking about their high priced college consultants. Many of them had paid over $30,000 and the fees were actually higher as that did not include fees for SAT tutoring, ect. Some spent almost $40,000.
What bothers me about them is that there are many students out there who do not have real passions, interests and talents that have been developed on their own over time, but instead they have parents who have hired professionals to repackage them to make them appear as if they had them. What this means is that an applicant who truly had the real passions, interests and talents could be competing with a fabricated one. The parents who pay these consultants these high figures not only have the money, but typically have children who have high grades and scores but who would probably appear ordinary against the other applicants with high grades and SAT scores. The consultant is usually paid to help make the applicant stand out. This is where repackaging comes in. The consultant might encourage and help an applicant publish some of their writings, help them get an amazing internship at a television station, with a senator ect, or any array of things which they think will make the applicant appear unusual, organize a major fundraiser. Often many of the consultants that are high paid have contacts that help the applicants get these opportunities.
I believe that the only time a consultant should be warranted is where the applicant attends a public school that is very large and there is virtually no college counseling. Then, I believe a college consultant should be chosen who is economical and who could help with coming up with a college list, and answering any questions the student and his or her parents might have.</p>
<p>Years ago, if someone had suggested that I would pay money to someone to do what I could easily do -- read a guidebook, create timetables and lists of places to visit, nag a teenager into meeting deadlines, look over an application to confirm that questions had been answered and directions followed, and glanced at an essay to spot glaring errors -- I would have scoffed. Not anymore. </p>
<p>I repeat what others have said. There is a big difference between paying $30,000-plus for full-on packaging and $2,500 or so for third-party assistance with a complex high-stakes task. Advice and assistance is worth paying for in other aspects of life. Why not this one? I live in a middle to upper-middle class school district with a single high school of 3,000 enrollment. There are six guidance counselors and for the most part, they are experienced, professional and extremely overworked. They do what they can but they cannot give one-on-one college counseling. It does not happen. </p>
<p>When my son started rolling his eyes and sighing every time I told him about advice or recommendations on how to handle the admissions process, we decided to hire an advisor on an hourly basis. Without the built-in friction of the parent-child relationship, she was able to get him to clarify his goals and desires for a college, fill out the application without omitting important personal details (ever the minimalist, he would leave activities and minor awards out because he figured they were not impressive enough), and gave him guidance -- not writing assistance --- on his essay. After one discussion with him, she urged him to send a supplemental brief note and a list of all the books on his bookshelf. (You can tell a lot about a person by what's on their bookshelf....) It was a great suggestion. This private consultant used to be a public school GC so she was effective in advising my son on how to talk to his GC and get the most out of someone with limited time for any one student. She read and commented on his essay, which was important since he refused to show it to us or anyone else due to the subject matter, which was very personal for him. </p>
<p>It's not that a consultant is a necessity, not at all. Many parents and students are able to work together on this process with great success. Some students do it entirely on their own. Paying a relatively modest fee -- I spent more on patio furniture -- for the assistance of a professional to help my son navigate the admissions process was worth every penny.</p>
<p>thats great that you felt the money you spent was worth it, it would be a shame if you didn't.</p>
<p>However it is far from necessary & for families like ours, who don't spend thousands on patio furniture let alone something that could be considered intangible, it isn't required for them to spend money for something that can be gotten for much cheaper
For some of us $3,000 isn't a decent set of table and chairs for the yard, it's what we have left after taxes to live on.</p>
<p>Kids at both my daughters high schools get into the same schools whether they pay for SAT prep tests or not, or hire a consultant or not.</p>
<p>I don't expect one on one college counseling from the high school, however my daughters public high school does offer that, as they do several college prep support groups which use professionals and volunteers to guide students for free.</p>
<p>So even students who have parents who aren't able to help guide their kids through high school, let alone into college, are able to get help and support.
It does take a lot of volunteers, and parents have to sign a release so that volunteers can be privy to personal information, but it is much appreciated by the students who otherwise would have little guidance at all.</p>
<p>We didn't know about CC, my D didn't study for the SAT and I never even saw any of her essays, but there was still a lot of free information online, and spending $100 on college guides combined with the support classes and such at the local library can net you a pretty good selection of schools, more than enough to apply for.</p>
<p>None of you need a college consultant. The reality is that there is so much information on this site.
Those high priced college consultants are really geared towards parents who want to pay to make their children stand out by making their ordinary interests appear extraordinary so they will have a leg up on those applicants who also have similar SAT scores and grades. These are wealthy parents whose children are applying to the ivy league and other elite schools and know that excellent grades and high SAT scores are not enough anymore.
The reality is that while many of those college consultants might help their client's children get into those schools, college admission officers are smart enough to realize which applicants have true talents and passions that they have nutured and developed and which applicants dont't but have paid some high priced college consultant to quickly get them published, signed up to build houses over the summer in an impoverished country ($cost per child is $6,000 to attend the summer program to boost their activity sheet) ect.
The college consultants try to help their applicants appear as if they have these passions, interests, talents, but admission officers can usually tell the difference.
I noticed when to the northeast to visit this summer, that parents particulary who have bright students and live in the New York, N.J, Connecticut area, have turned where their children get into college into cocktail party conversation. It has almost become an extension of who the parents are to say where their children got into college. It is almost as if by saying Harvard, Yale, Princeton ect that parent gains addiitional status, which is absurd. These are the parents who will pay any amount of money and use any connection in the book, even having their husband do a fundraiser for his corporation and have his son or daughter put their name on it so they can gain entry to the top ivy league schools.
I live in a part of the country where there is small time networking and parents are more impressed if someone's child went to the state university to make connections. Students here who get into the top ivy league are able to do it because they truly were extraordinary on their own.</p>
<p>EK, Just my observation, but in our area, those that did not do a SAT prep did not do as well as those that did prep (this is a generalization). Most students in our hs do prep work, and sadly, it often begins in 4th grade!! Many also take a few week prep class during their junior year (in a group), a few weeks before their scheduled test date. My son says that the students that began prepping in 4th grade did not do much better than those students who prepped for a few sessions during junior year. He also says that they sacrificed a lot of their childhood for little gain.</p>
<p>I have not noticed any difference in college acceptances between those with private consultants and those without them. I am sure that there must be some students/parents that don't discuss using a private consultant. Nobody I know has used a consultant that was more than 2,000. They were hired by parents that generally did not know much about various schools, and did not have/want to take the time to investigate, or help with forms/apps, and were able to afford to pay. Generally, these parents have students that were totally unmotivated and uninterested in actively participating in the admissions process, and frankly have little understanding about the entire subject.</p>
<p>I competely agree that no one needs to hire a consultant, even the lower cost ones. No one should think that if they don't hire one their child will be at an disadvantage in the process. (Although, I do think that many students who do the application totally on their own with no assistance or oversight CAN be putting themselves at a disadvantage depending on where they're applying.)</p>
<p>OTOH, people should not be made to feel that they are doing something unethical or extravagant because they choose to hire a professional to help guide their student's college application process. My son was not unmotivated or uninterested--- a bit of a slug and a minimalist maybe but not totally out of it. We just could not communicate well with him during that time. He didn't want to be told what he should do and it was me, not him, reading the "instruction" books on how to apply to selective colleges. (Didn't know about CC until apps were already in. I stay on for S2 and have learned a lot). It was completely worth it to have a nonparent adult to talk to him, give advice, look over the application etc. </p>
<p>The friends of mine who I know who also hired a professional consultant are not clueless ignoramuses either. One was a teacher whose daughter (in CA) wanted to attend an East Coast college so this friend hired an East Coast consultant to help with identifying reach-match-safety and to give advice specific to the applying to the No. 1 choice. (She did get in.) This friend paid $3,000 and would do it again. Another friend is a very smart businesswoman who found communicating with her daughter frustrating and the foot-dragging worrisome. I suggested CC to her but she preferred to go with a consultant. She hired an acquaintance who is just starting out in the field and charged $1,500. Even her daughter (a HS senior) said recently that she is so glad she has Helen to work with her. They (and we) didn't hire the consultant with the notion that it would give us a boost into a particular college. It was a service to help ease the stress for everyone in the family by having a third party guide the student rather than a parent.</p>